Laying The Foundation

I want to begin by thanking all of my very loyal customers out there. You have been the backbone of my little dream and I am so thankful for all of you who have supported me through the years. I pointed out on social media that I had been taking a course on improving my business. I have learned so much in the first four lectures with many more to come. Being a business owner comes with much trial and error, mistakes, and learning curves. Where I was 5 years ago to where I am today is like night and day. And I have enjoyed every second of this journey.

The courses I have been taking have been to help me move my jewelry into the right direction. I have decided that I am at the point where I want my jewelry to move to the next level.

Small Changes Thus Far:

• improved website layout
• improved about me page with loads of info
• giving back to our planet

Now to get to the meat and bones of this post

As a small business owner it is my responsibility to ensure I am pricing everything correctly, not only for you but most importantly so I can continue to create and drive my vision of Gold Arrow Studios. Through my education course I am taking, I have found that I have undervalued myself and my business. It was such a hard lesson to learn because through the years I have just been staying afloat and for the life of me could not figure out why. I was selling a lot but still it felt I was working and not in turn profiting which is the goal of a business. The course I am taking opened up my eyes tremendously. I was charging so little for my beautiful designs and not valuing myself or my time or my business.

At first I did shed some tears for three reasons.

• ONE: I was so mad at myself for all the work I had done and it was not paying off
• TWO: because I was charging half of what I needed 
• THREE: how were my loyal customers going to feel 

After much thinking and talking with others and thinking again, I decided that if I want to continue to drive this business I needed to do what was best for the business. So you will see on my site that I have increased my prices. I know for some it will be a shock, for others you may say well its about time Melissa! I have had people through the years tell me I charge too little but I always felt I was charging what I should....clearly I should have listened. 

I am always transparent with my people...I never ever want you to feel that I am hiding things or being sneaky about how I go about things. I want you to know why I do what I do. I know I may lose some of you as customers, and I understand that. I also know I will gain customers because the value of my pieces is clearly shown in my work. I hope you will stick with me and understand why I did what I did. If you have any questions, please feel free to comment below. I will absolutely answer anything I can.

Remember that when you are purchasing pieces from me that I do hand make everything, nothing is outsourced. I do carefully package all of your pieces, nothing is from a hired hand. I answer all of your questions, its my voice replying not a virtual assistant. Everything I do, I do for my customers and I hope that is the feeling your get every time you purchase from me.